Whom to ask
- the oldest in the family: grandma, grandpa, an aunt
- ask while you still can
- record it on your phone
Getting started
Start with the oldest
A family tree does not start in an archive but at the kitchen table. A few names and dates are enough, the rest is in the parish registers.
- 1 name with a year and a village
- usually the same day the first record, free, within a week at the latest
- the 1700s how far back we usually see
The first step
Ask while you can
What to write down
- names, for women the maiden name too
- years and villages of births, weddings and deaths
- where they lived and what they did
What to look for at home
- birth and marriage certificates
- obituaries, photos with captions
- a family bible, ship papers, naturalization records
The village matters most: the one your ancestor came from, in today's Czech Republic. If the family only remembers it roughly, or spells it the old way, write it as you know it. We will find it.
Yourself, or with us
What you can do yourself and where it gets hard
The last hundred years are in the family. Older records are in Czech archives and are hard to read.
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Yourself: Dates of the living and their parents.
With us: Records before 1926, those are in the archives.
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Yourself: Stories and photos from the album.
With us: The script: old German handwriting, Latin, German.
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Yourself: Documents from the drawer.
With us: Jumps between parishes and books.
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Yourself: One name, a year and a village.
With us: Checking that it really is your ancestor.
Then one name is enough
Three steps to the whole family
You enter one ancestor
Free, we send their record from the register, usually the same day, within a week at the latest.
You search further
You choose how many ancestors and which side of the family. $9 (€8) for every one we find.
You get the family tree
From 1784 on we look for every ancestor the registers preserved.
Start with one ancestor
A name, a year and a village. We send the record from the register for free, usually the same day, within a week at the latest.
- We search parish registers from Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia.
- An ancestor born in 1920 or earlier.